Earthbound

September 13, 1992|BY DON DARNELL, a Chicago free-lance writer.

Now, the passenger to his right was . . . smiling? . . . ``Mom!`` he thought. She looked young, and pretty, like when he was a little boy. They were on the Pair-o-Chute ride at Riverview Park. He had really been too young for the ride-the sign said you had to be 12-but his mother loved scary rides. She got him on. He recalled how sick his stomach felt when the pulley lines released the army surplus silk hoisting their little seat to the top of the tower-those seconds before the big umbrella would catch air and yank them up momentarily; then float them back to earth, his mom smiling and cheering wildly as they watched the Loop skyline disappear behind treetops off to their right.

He now realized that he had never seen his mother smile so big-not so big as when they were falling over Riverview. He turned to look at the woman next to him and grimaced; it was definitely not his mother.

He thought of that 1950s Life magazine photo of the well-dressed young woman who had jumped to her death from the observation deck of the Empire State Building. If you hadn`t read the caption you would have thought the pretty lady in white gloves was simply catching 40 winks atop the crushed sedan parked on West 33rd. He wondered if he and the woman next to him would die so gracefully.

He addressed the deity he knew best: Please! In Jesus` name! Let us pass out! (He refused to think of the thin lady as already dead.) His tone grew in urgency: In Jesus` name! Please let us pass out! And immediately he was upset with himself for having used a four-letter word talking to God while only heartbeats from certain death.

Next, his eyes focused on a dark spot on the woman`s stomach, just below her navel. At first he thought it was a birthmark-a birthmark in the shape of a bird, or . . . A butterfly!, he apprised himself. He stretched his neck against incredible forces for a better look . . . Well, I`ll be a . . . It`s a tattoo! And again he chided himself, for bothering with such a trivial thing at a time like this.

He was considering what a nightmare this whole affair was when he thought that maybe that was it. That maybe this was just a very realistic dream! He screamed with all his might hoping to wake himself up. But he and the thin lady kept spinning and somersaulting downward. He felt himself lose his continental breakfast.

It was all par for the course, he reasoned; par, becuse he was speeding to his death through the stratosphere over Lincoln Park with a nearly naked woman-she still had on her underpants and Reeboks. He figured that this was some kind of poetic justice for his amorous forays back in the `70s, back before herpes and AIDS checked his generation`s ribaldry. He thought of all the people down there he might have wronged in any way. He imagined them all gathered together at his favorite lakefront cafe drinking coffee-they were looking up-laughing.

And it was taking so long. He rationalized that their momentum, along with some tailwind off Lake Michigan, was carrying them laterally, inland, as they fell, increasing their hang time. He felt her metal shard stab him once, twice, a third time in the ear. He hated, and envied, and loved, the thin woman.

His brain activity intensified. He became Icarus. . . . No!

. . . Daedalus, changing his mind hurriedly. He caught a glimpse of the Sears Tower, which made him think of his disk jockey friend, Mick Mitchells, who would be up there on the 90th floor doing his morning air shift at WLAC Radio. On a clear day Mick could easily spot Dyksma`s high-rise six miles up the coast. He wondered if Mick happened to be looking out just now.

Thoughts of his friend at the radio station made him think of the sensational news pieces that would most assuredly hit the airwaves in a half hour or so. He envisioned the local TV news stars with their wrinkled brows and twinkling eyes looking away in affected sadness from their teleprompters-they would be in for this ``news special``-as they read of the doomed airliner with 100-and-so-and-so passengers and crew aboard. And then Dyksma`s head swung into the naked woman`s skull with tremendous force. It brought him back. He looked down to catch his bearings. . . .

And it was all too vivid. Coach seats 27A and B, and their two occupants, were now plummeting in such a fashion that Dyksma had occasional and relatively lengthy glimpses of what was coming up to meet them. Now he knew for sure that the 727 must have broken apart just as they made their turn away from the lake toward O`Hare.

The two of them were moving westward between Montrose Harbor and the high-rise-his high-rise! He could clearly see the little turquois rectangle in the rec area. He grabbed at the woman`s floundering left arm until he found her hand. He squeezed her fingers tightly in his and hollered: ``Here we go honey! Let`s try for the pool!`` as if they had a say.